Top Ten Greatest Irish Movies for St. Patrick’s Day
1. Angela's Ashes (1999)
Frank McCourt's memoir Angela's Ashes was successful because he infused his
poverty-stricken youth with wit, hope, and a knack for storytelling. Alan Parker's
1999 film adaptation enlivens a miserable story with romanticized ghettos,
beautifully soot-stained urchins, and other tragedies made pretty.
Three boys play McCourt at various stages of his life. Emily Watson works well as
mother Angela, a woman tormented by her husband's (Robert Carlyle) alcoholism.
Instead of unleashing the destructive unpredictability of a drunk dad, director
Parker settles for pleasant vignettes and apt details, glossing over of the grim bits
that were a constant throughout the book's narrative.
2. The Boxer (1997)
Director Jim Sheridan and actor Daniel Day-Lewis team up for their third – and
most immediate – film about Northern Ireland. The chemistry between Day-Lewis
and Watson burns up the screen, creating a fiery edge-of-your-seat intensity. And
that's the romantic part of the film. There's also the drama surrounding the
Troubles. A changed political climate in which a fragile Northern Ireland teeters on
the brink of violence during the cease fire makes 1997's The Boxer even more
intense than In the Name of the Father.
Recently released after serving a 14-year prison sentence for doing the IRA a
favor, Danny Flynn (Day-Lewis) longs for peace in his life. He also wants another
go at the boxing career he left behind when he went to jail. Danny's hope for peace
is threatened when he's reunited with his old girlfriend, Maggie (Watson), who's
since married his best friend and had a child. Maggie doesn't love her husband,
who is now in jail himself, but can't go back to Danny because of an IRA code of
loyalty. Maggie's father, a local IRA leader (Brian Cox), can't offer Danny any
protection because of the code and a firebrand underling who prefers the days of
guns and violence—within and outside the IRA.
3. The Butcher Boy (1997)
A small-town Irish boy's rambunctious nature turns violent in this 1997 shocker
from filmmaker Neil Jordan (The Crying Game and Michael Collins). Thirteenyear-old Francie Brady (Eamonn Owens) retreats from his father's (Stephen Rea)
drunkenness and his mother's (Aisling O'Sullivan) depression into a world of
manic fantasy that begins with a prank on his nasty neighbor Mrs. Nugent (Fiona
Shaw) and ends, well, apropos the film's title. Based on the novel by Patrick
McCabe.
4. The Commitments (1991)
Director Alan Parker presents a decidedly unromantic portrait of working-class
Ireland, and he does it with flair and authenticity. Ambitious wheeler-dealer Jimmy
Rabbitte (Robert Arkins) thinks that Dublin needs a top-rate soul band. A series of
hilarious auditions produces a motley crew that may in fact be the real thing. The
1991 film remains one of the best music movies ever made. The Commitments is
the first novel in Roddy Doyle's Barrytown Trilogy.
5. In the Name of the Father (1993)
Daniel Day-Lewis and director Jim Sheridan reunited for this intense docudrama
about a group of Belfast ne'er do wells who were tortured into admitting to
masterminding and executing a deadly terrorist bombing that killed five in
Guildford, England. Gerry Conlon (Day-Lewis) and his father (Pete Postelthwaite)
served in prison together, and the interaction between the two characters is both
heart-wrenching and uplifting. The 1993 film was nominated for seven Oscars,
including Best Picture, Actor, Director, Supporting Actor, and Supporting Actress.
6. Michael Collins (1996)
Michael Collins was a bold project for director Neil Jordan to undertake, as the
title character is not a well-known figure on these shores, and he's a controversial
one in Ireland and England. But he got a boost when the 1996 film and Liam
Neeson in the title role won top honors at the Venice Film Festival.
Collins (Neeson) led the underground Irish Volunteers in their fight against
English occupation of Ireland. He organized the group shortly after the Easter
Uprising of 1916 and commanded the bloody fight between the Volunteers and
English spies and troops stationed in Ireland. Jordan threw a love triangle into the
mix, with Collins and his right-hand man Harry Boland (Aidan Quinn) both falling
for Kitty Kiernan (Julia Roberts). Collins's reputation as freedom fighter and hero
suffered irreparably when he compromised with the British, leaving Northern
Ireland under crown rule. He was shot at age 31, and some suspected former ally
Eamon de Valera (Alan Rickman) was in on plans to assassinate Collins.
7. My Left Foot (1989)
Far from a "disease-of-the-week" film, My Left Foot poignantly tells the true story
of Christy Brown, an Irish writer-painter who was born with cerebral palsy and
only had the use of his left foot. Daniel Day-Lewis won a Best Actor Oscar for his
portrayal of Brown as an adult. Brenda Fricker won a Best Supporting Actress for
her role as his mother. Day-Lewis's performance is an emotional tour de force,
perfectly capturing Brown's mercurial temperament.
8. The Snapper (1993)
The Curley family of working-class Dublin is thrown for a loop when 20-year-old
daughter Sharon (Tina Kellegher) announces that she's pregnant but refuses to
reveal the identity of the father. The news quickly spreads, and Tina's situation
becomes the talk of the pub. Her father, played by Colm Meaney in fine form, is at
first outraged and then protective of his daughter as the rumor mill churns at full
throttle. The pregnancy doesn't hinder Sharon's nightly trips to the local watering
hole, but it does go a long way in strengthening the father-daughter bond. A tight,
briskly paced comedy anchored by fully realized characters. This was the second
installment in Roddy Doyle's Barrytown Trilogy.
9. Some Mother's Son (1996)
In 1981 Northern Ireland, a mother faces the heart-wrenching decision of whether
to let her son die for his cause. Kathleen Quigley (Helen Mirren), once fiercely
apolitical, finds herself in the middle of the Troubles after British police invade her
home on Christmas day and arrest her son, Gerard (Aidan Gillen), for involvement
in an IRA bombing. The 1996 film focuses on the hunger strike led by Bobby
Sands (John Lynch) in which 10 protestors, including Sands, died.
The nonviolent protests were triggered by Margaret Thatcher's decision to have
imprisoned IRA soldiers classified as criminals rather than political prisoners.
Gerard participates in the strike, and when he slips into a coma, Kathleen has the
legal right to have him force-fed. She finds a friend in Annie Higgins (Fionnula
Flanagan), who also has a son near death. While Kathleen battles spiritually and
morally with her son's fate, Higgins respects her son's wishes, no matter how
painful the result. Some Mother's Son is a loose sequel to 1993's In the Name of the
Father. While the earlier film pretended an objectivity, Some Mother's Son openly
portrays the British government as a brutally oppressive regime. Moving but
profoundly sad.
10. The Dead (1987)
This 1987 elegy, based on the James Joyce short story, was legendary director John
Huston's last effort. Set during a festive holiday dinner, the film reveals the
vulnerabilities of the characters as they revel with song, talk, and alcohol. Anjelica
Huston stars as an unhappy wife who makes a sad confession to her husband that
only reinforces his regrets.
Source: Infoplease.com